Ukrainian Catholic Church gains three eparchies (12/03/00)

Ukrainian Catholic Church gains three eparchies

VATICAN CITY - Pope John Paul II has given his blessing to the creation of three new Ukrainian Catholic eparchies and approved the three bishops elected to lead them, reported the Catholic News Service.

In an October 12 statement, the Vatican said the pope agreed with the decisions made by the Synod of Bishops of the Ukrainian Catholic Church.

The new dioceses are: Buchach and Sokal-Zhovkva, which were split off from the Eparchies of Ternopil and Stryi, which includes territory taken from the Archeparchy of Lviv.

According to Vatican statistics, more than 1.4 million people live within the boundaries of the new dioceses, and more than 860,000 of them are Ukrainian Catholics.

Auxiliary Bishop Irynei Bilyk, 50, of Ivano-Frankivsk is the new bishop of Buchach.

Bishop Mykhailo Koltun, 51, of Zboriv is the new bishop of Sokal-Zhovkva.

Auxiliary Bishop Julian Gbur, 57, of Lviv was elected the new bishop of Stryi.

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